The foremost and primary application of the subject invention is in the mailbox art. Other relevant applications would be to newspaper receptacles or parcel drop boxes, wherein the user must extract the contents after a deposit therein of specified types of articles. The invention additionally has wider application to containers used in business or other purposes for intermediate or temporary storage of items intended for later usage. In this respect, since the primary application of this invention is to the manufacture and construction of mailboxes, the following discussion will be directed mainly to this type of container, with the understanding that the background will be substantially similar for the other types of devices and that the invention has such wider applicability.
The construction and usage of mailboxes of the type used primarily in rural or suburban areas differs significantly from those used in older urban areas. In this respect, in urban areas of moderate or large-sized cities, mailboxes are usually appended directly to a dwelling, and as such they are generally offset from the road, generally distal from the roadway on which the dwelling is located. In comparison, mailboxes in rural areas and many suburban areas are usually affixed above the ground on a vertical post positioned adjacent the road. In this respect, the mailbox door, or entranceway, is universally faced towards the roadway. This latter facet enables the mailman to open the mailbox door and insert mail while in the mail delivery vehicle. Obviously, in order to comply with such latter requirement, the end of the mailbox with entrance door is usually emplaced extremely close to the edge of the roadway travelled by the mail delivery vehicle. Frequently, this roadway travelled by the mail truck is a heavily traversed thoroughfare, with vehicles passing at moderate to high speeds a relatively few feet from the mailbox entrance door. One can readily ascertain the relative danger to the postal patron by the proximity of the mailbox to the roadway traffic, in view of the fact that the user must step close to the roadway traffic in order to extract the mail from the box. The potential for vehicular-pedestrian mishaps is substantial under such circumstances, and the thread of serious injury is a very real danger. The danger lies in the fact that the patron, or any family member who seeks to obtain the mail from the mailbox, must step in front of the box to open the doorway, and pull out the mail accordingly. Such a procedure normally entails the need to stand in front of the box or close thereto. This aspect clearly presents a potential danger by reason of the close proximity.
This invention is conceived as a means to overcome the foregoing problems and devise a mailbox which avoids or alleviates, to a substantial degree, the potential for highway accidents involving persons who are extracting mail from a mailbox. The following objects of the subject invention are directed accordingly.